Homeland or fire. Discursive analysis of an Open Letter about fires on islands in the Paraná Delta (year 2020)

Abstract

In this article we develop discursive analyzes positioned from perspectives of the French school
of discourse analysis (Amossy, 2016, 2017 and 2018; Maingueneau, 2010). We interpret a Corpus
of Analysis constructed around the social problems caused by fire in the Parana’s Delta that
mainly occupied the jurisdiction of the Province of Entre Ríos, Argentina, but which affected the
City of Rosario, causing the deployment of a large media enunciative mass, social mobilizations
and government interventions around the reference “fire on the islands.” We select and interpret
an “Open Letter to Mr. President Alberto Fernández” by which it was denounced the situation
of “burning on the islands” and was widely disseminated and supported through the change.
org platform and on it we apply a series of discourse analysis categories such as “controversial
discourse”, “counter-recipients” and “ethos”, part of Classical rhetoric taken up by the French
school. Finally, we open the discussion with the following questions: if the claim expressed
in the Open Letter invokes planning and governance over the territory, does this constitute a
political or police act (Rancière, 2000)? What other modes of democratic management can be
carried out in the face of this socio-environmental conflict?